Activist Urges Boycott of Catholic Leaders Who Support Illegal Aliens
by Chad Groening
April 12, 2006
(AgapePress) - - A Roman Catholic immigration reform activist is joining a growing number of her fellow Catholics in calling for a boycott of parishes and dioceses that support the deliberate violation of American immigration laws.Cardinal Roger Mahony heads the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, the largest Catholic archdiocese in the United States. As an outspoken supporter of illegal aliens, Mahony has criticized a bill that would tighten enforcement of immigration laws, a position that puts him at odds with an increasing number of church members who support the legislation.
According to Susan Tully of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), many Roman Catholics are unhappy with their church leaders who, like Mahony, advocate for illegal aliens. "I am a Catholic, and there's a whole bunch of us who are calling for a boycott of the Catholic Church," she says.
"n other words," Tully explains, "we're telling other Catholics, 'If you want to go to church to receive communion and a service or whatever, that would be fine, but do not financially support [the church]." And as for Cardinal Mahony, she contends, it is important for church members to remember what is truly motivating him.
The Catholic Church in America "is a church that was dying on the vine," the immigration reform activist asserts, "until it was flooded with illegal aliens from Mexico, Central and South America, who are 99.9 percent Catholic." She says those illegal immigrants "started giving everything they had to Mahoney to build his huge Taj Mahal that he's now been able to build as a shrine to himself."
Cardinal Mahony "wouldn't exist" today as the head of the largest U.S. archdiocese, Tully contends, "if it weren't for the illegal aliens who support him." Therefore, she maintains, his support and that of other Catholic leaders for immigrant lawbreakers is all about politics, "and people need to realize that."
The Los Angeles cardinal's calls for solidarity with "undocumented" immigrants has nothing to do with so-called guest workers and their families, FAIR's spokeswoman insists. "Mahony is not driven by some direction from God, I promise you; it's the direction from his bank account," she says.
Tully says what Mahoney and others like him have done has made the majority of the Catholics with whom she talks "very unhappy," and "they're making their voices heard." She joins them in urging fellow Catholics to withhold support from clergy that publicly advocate for illegal aliens and to support instead those church leaders who stand up for the rule of law.
Chad Groening, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
